


In Love I've Always Been A Mercenary

by aybeexinfinity



Category: Inglourious Basterds (2009)
Genre: Assassins, Childhood Friends, Childhood Trauma, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-10
Updated: 2012-07-10
Packaged: 2021-03-15 13:33:51
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,198
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29314902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aybeexinfinity/pseuds/aybeexinfinity
Summary: After the success of Operation Kino and the fall of Hitler, the remainders of the Inglourious Basterds disband. A series of unstoppable events is launched when an assassin fails to kill Stiglitz--dredging up memories that had long since been abandoned.
Relationships: Hugo Stiglitz/Original Female Character(s)





	In Love I've Always Been A Mercenary

The last ashy bits of the cigarette snowflaked to the ground as I waited for the call. It was warm outside, warmer than it’d been in weeks. Summer was finally deciding to show, and everyone who passed me seemed to feel it. It was odd, how something as unpredictable as the weather could have such an effect on people. It didn’t make any sense. People went into depression when winter rolled around as if the world itself stopped turning.  
  
Some guy approached me as I stomped out the cigarette on the cement, trying to make small talk and use a lame pick up line he’d probably found in a book. The gun lodged in the back of my waistband was cool against my skin, heavy on my body. It was unfortunate that a license to kill didn’t exactly give me the liberty to start flashing the piece around to scare the guy off. Men’s tunnel vision was one of their worst qualities; if they wanted to fuck you it didn’t matter if you said you were married or had a boyfriend or were a lesbian or just didn’t fucking want to: every word you say, to them, is you just trying not to look easy. You secretly want them, but you want them to work for it.  
  
The walkie talkie buzzed in my pocket and I took it out, blatantly ignoring the guy and listening to the message. It was just one word: _green_. The green light to go, to start, to commence. The term that meant right now, on the sixth floor of this fancy hotel, my target had just entered his room. I put the device away, turning on my heel and walking down the alley to get to the fire escape. The guy was screaming something after me, likely about how I was a prude or a bitch or wouldn’t ever find a man.  
  
Jumping, I locked my hands onto the bottom of the fire escape and heaved myself up, trying to be quiet on the old metal structure as I climbed up the stairs. Only two of the windows had been covered, but I ignored all the other people I saw on the way up. I had one job, and it was not to look at these people’s weekend getaway adventures.  
  
When I got to the sixth floor window I pulled out a knife and slipped it into the crack to jimmy the lock open silently. The television was blaring, which meant I could open the window a bit faster than an inch per minute. Slipping through the window, I was sure to close it behind me just as I’d been taught in training. I’d memorized the layout of this room and knew that it was a straight walk from the bedroom suite I’d entered to the living area where the television was blasting.  
  
Twelve and a half steps to the couch where the target sat. Short, dirty blonde hair, mid-thirties, physically fit. Get the upper hand with an execution shot so they don’t have the chance to overpower you. Females may be smaller and weaker, but strength does not always win the battle. Bullets kill, not muscles. Agility over weight training. Proper stance over blunt force. Exit strategies over cyanide pills. As a woman your whole existence is a weapon: you must learn to be lethal.  
  
Holding my breath, I cocked the gun and took aim. The target was better than I was briefed on, though, with astounding reflexes and quick movements. Before I could get a good shot on him he’d rolled down from the couch and taken cover, pulling out a piece of his own and taking aim as I commanded him to drop it. I dove behind the closest piece of furniture, heart racing. The briefing had been way off. Who the hell was this guy? I forced myself back into a position of composure and control, throwing something across the room to distract him and get the upper hand.  
  
He was quick, but I was quicker. Darting around the couch while he shot at my distraction, I held the gun to his head and forced him onto his back with my foot. The edge of my heel dug into his chest as I took aim, but the sight of his face stopped me in my tracks. My eyes grew wide, mimicking his, as I hesitated. My hands lowered slightly as my mind tried to catch up with everything, a panic growing in my heart.  
  
“Stiglitz?”

* * *

  
Germany—especially pre-world war Germany—was not the greatest place to grow up in. My parents had been like most; wanting only the best for their child. There weren’t many differences between public and private schools, other than the prestige around saying you went to a privately funded educational facility.  
  
At least, that’s the way it should have been. Pay a little more, get to wear a uniform and have selected classmates instead of a melting pot of anyone within the school’s district. It was like that, for the most part, but like all things there was a hidden layer; a darker layer.  
  
The school’s budget was much larger than public schools, which meant the students were able to get access to a plethora of first grade activities. There were the expected mandatory classes—math, language, science, the arts—but physical education was where we differed. We didn’t play soccer or dodge ball or basketball. We ran obstacle courses and practiced archery and learned how to walk without making a sound.  
  
Men in suits would come every year at Christmas time and we would have an assembly. They were quick affairs, but after just one you knew that they were dark and unhappy, even if you never knew why. Children’s names would be read off a list by one of the men and they would stand in the audience. When the list was finished the children were herded out the side doors, onto a school bus, and never seen again.  
  
I was chosen on my twelfth birthday, a year with only three other potentials. Once on the bus they took us to a big compound in the middle of nowhere. There was a ten foot fence running around the perimeter and a series of big white buildings with very few windows. There were fields with large, intricate obstacle courses and simulation rooms. That place would be my home for the rest of my life.  
  
They brought my parents into the room I’d been stuck in and explained what was happening. They said how I had showed promise in all of their carefully crafted tests, that I had an able mind and an able body; that I would make just the kind of worker they strived for, in time. They explained that they would take care of me now, and that they could come and see me once a month. I was allowed one weekly phone call and one escorted visit out of the compound every three months.  
  
When my parents tried to protest, they were assured that there was nothing they could do about it. They were asked not to fight, not to make things difficult for themselves and just to accept that their daughter would be bred into greatness. They allowed me to hug my parents one last time before they painted the white walls with my father’s blood. They held a gun to my mother’s screaming face and told me if I ever tried to escape, if I ever tried to get help or disobeyed, they would kill her too.  
  
They escorted my mother off the premises and led me to an auditorium with at least thirty other kids. I was placed in the front row, and as the last attendant left a boy walked onto the stage. He was no older than sixteen, and he walked like someone with the weight of the world on their shoulders. He stared at us, then at the guard, who nodded, before looking back at us. He took a deep breath and held it for a moment before speaking.  
  
“Call me Stiglitz. You’re going to learn how to use a gun. Don’t miss your target.” He stared out at us and pointed at me. “You, up, now.”  
  
I was still reeling from everything that had happened, and it took a nudge from the guard’s rifle to make my feet move to the stage. The boy handed me a gun and told me to take aim. He fixed my posture, told me to breathe, and stepped away. I imagine the attendant’s head in the middle of the target, looked into his would-be terrified eyes, and hit the middle of the mark.  
  
“Good. Name?”

* * *

  
“Löw?” He breathed, his rising chest moving my foot up and down. This had never happened. I had never hesitated, not _once_ , on a job. But what fucking game were they playing at? Having a client who wanted Stiglitz dead was one thing, but sending me to do the job—they were either very sick in the head or the new management up top hadn’t done their homework.  
  
“On your knees.” I said sternly, trying to look around the room without really moving my head. I couldn’t see any of the hidden cameras currently used by the company, but I knew Stiglitz would have searched the place himself. I made a buzzing noise, my way of wordlessly asking if his sweep was clean. He nodded his head and I sighed. “I don’t know what the fuck they’re playing at but there are eyes on you somewhere so keep your head down and don’t move your lips much.”  
  
“South east rooftop.” He said quietly, hands locked behind his head and eyes staring at the floor. South east was directly behind me, and I moved more to block him while I tried to figure out what we were going to do.  
  
“I—I can’t kill you.” I stuttered out, scanning my mind for viable safe houses to go to that the company didn’t already know about. To disobey meant death of the person I loved most in the world. I hadn’t felt panic like this in years, my heart hammering against my chest. Each second that passed let my watcher know that I was hesitating, debating, considering disobedience. “Hugo, I don’t know what to do.”  
  
“Kill him and we’ll leave.” He said simply. I ran through the only other possible scenario in my head—faking his death. I could pretend to shoot him, have him knock over the wine glass to make it look like blood, but I always left after the killing. Someone else came for the body. I could drag him out but they would see it suspiciously. Stiglitz was right. He was always right. I took a deep breath and prepared myself. “Make it count.”  
  
Two shots, that’s all I would allow myself. One to break the glass, one to kill the company man; my watcher who waited by in case I couldn’t do the job. I turned, took aim and fired the shots as Stiglitz got to his feet and grabbed a duffle bag out of the closet. The man on the roof fell back and Stiglitz grabbed me, pulling me out of the room and into the hallway. I had done my part: he was in the lead now.  
  
We took the stairs, a maximum of five minutes on the clock until the block would be swarmed with back up. They were always kept close in the area, and when the watcher didn’t respond to them on the walkie-talkie they would know what had happened. He led me to a black GAZ M21 Volga, the latest model in the line. If we weren’t in imminent mortal danger, I would have teased him about it.  
  
He threw his bag into the back and I crashed into the passenger’s seat, reaching over and pulling his seat belt on for him as he began to speed out of the parking garage. I barely got mine on before he sharply turned a corner. There was only one thought running through my mind, but it would have to wait until we got to some sort of safe house.  
  
We were silent the whole time. I busied myself by tending to my gun, pulling it apart and putting it back together; my form of a nervous twitch. It took thirteen and a half minutes for the car to finally slow and pull into the driveway of a small farmhouse. In synchronization we exited the car and I reached over the top to help pull the tarp over the vehicle.  
  
He steered me to the side entrance, knocking out some sequence on the door before it was opened. The man looked familiar, and after a minute I recognized him as one of the Basterds that had survived—Hirschberg. There were no questions asked; we were let in immediately and led down a flight of stairs into a room with metal walls. I searched for the phone, picking it up immediately and pulling the rotary numbers around to the appropriate sequence.  
  
“Hello?”  
  
“Mama it’s time.” I said quickly. “You need to leave immediately; do you remember what we practised?”  
  
“Are you hurt?”  
  
“I’m fine; do you remember, Mama?”  
  
“Yes, yes.”  
  
“Go. I’ll call when I can. I love you.”  
  
I slammed the receiver down before wasting another second, praying she moved quickly enough to the house down the street. Making two more calls to different people I’d come to an agreement with in the case of what was happening, my heart rate finally began to settle. For the time being, she would be safe.  
  
“Jesus, Stiglitz, what the hell is going on?” His friend asked, looking between us.  
  
“Jenny.” Stiglitz nodded towards Hirschberg, meaning for me to explain as he crouched down and started unpacking his arsenal. Holding out my hand, Hirschberg shook it quickly.  
  
“Jeneva Löw, I’m a mercenary. Sixteen hours ago I was hired to kill him.”  
  
“You…” I didn’t know what he was more stuck on, seeing a female assassin or the fact someone would dare try and kill Stiglitz. “Well then how come you’re here?”  
  
“Old friends.” I nodded to Stiglitz as he strapped weapons onto his body. “I’ve got a bad feeling about what their plan is though. How isolated is this place? Where are the best exits? Nearby hideouts? Forests? Anything?”  
  
“Secret tunnel on your right to a safe house I built at the start of the war. Warehouse a few blocks away if you need to escape—cars out back full of gas.” He said, locking his hands behind his neck. “You said you think you know what they’re doing?”  
  
“I heard this story once when I was still in the academy.” I began as Stiglitz got to his feet. He twirled his finger, motioning for me to lift up my hair. He started strapping guns and ammo onto my body, putting clips in my pockets and lifting up my pant leg to put another gun there. He handed me a mousegun and I fastened it into my bra. “About two brothers who had left the academy to become full timers. They did their jobs perfectly for twenty three years, but everyone’s got an expiry date. When the company decided their time was up, they set up a job for one of the brothers to kill the other without letting them know who the target was. It ended up being a trap to get them together and dispose of them both at once.”  
  
“But Stiglitz, I thought you left years ago?”  
  
“They try every year.” He said simply.  
  
“They’re using me. Counting on the fact that I’d run and that I can’t run forever.” I sighed, running my hands through my hair. “They’re going to chase us into a corner.”  
  
Stiglitz must’ve known this already, because he didn’t even react. Just kept prepping himself with whatever he had in that never ending bag. I guess that was the life you chose to lead when you try and quit a job that will never quit you. He pulled out three grenades and tossed them to Hirschberg before throwing the empty duffle bag aside.  
  
“Use them if you’re followed.” He commanded of his friend. “Take the car outside. Hellstrom Street.”  
  
“Good luck.” Hirschberg said, quickly nodding to the both of us before disappearing up the stairs. Stiglitz crossed to the right wall and started knocking until a panel echoed back empty. He felt around the bottom of the panel and clicked something that popped it out, revealing a black tunnel. Grabbing a spool of thread from his pocket he tossed it to me and motioned to the latch on the back of the panel.  
  
“Trigger trap.” He explained. I nodded, unwinding a length of string and cutting it off with my teeth. Looping half of it around the latch, I tied both ends to the pin of the grenade he handed me. If they found this place, we’d at least have a warning.  
  
Stiglitz sent me in first, lifting the panel and locking it back into place. There was no light in the tunnel, and even with the lighter he took out it was almost impossible to see. He took my hand and briskly led me the way he must have memorized years ago. The Basterds had disbanded ten years ago, having worked only one mission together, and the remaining members still had more reliability than the people I’d been employed by for practically my whole life.

* * *

  
He was cursing at me, shoving his hands against my shoulders and treating me as if my very existence disgusted him. I cried, telling him I was sorry and that I hadn’t meant to upset him. He raised his hand to hit me but was stopped short by the target calling out for him to stop. I kept the tears coming as the man walked up, got into Stiglitz’s face and told him off for his behaviour. When Stiglitz left, the man tended to me before offering to escort me inside the bar.  
  
“Thank you so much.” I said through my choppy breaths, working carefully not to smudge my makeup as I wiped the tears. It was just so easy to play the damsel in distress. I began to unravel this sob story of how we’d been together since we graduated and that we had gotten married far too young. I explained how he’d just _changed_ one day and I didn’t know what to do. I broke down again before telling him how often I got hit and how I feared for my life.  
  
“Is there nothing you can do?” He asked. I tilted my head down and looked up at him: the doe-eyed effect. It made they eyes look bigger and the body look smaller, innocent; it sparked the desire to protect in all men. He shifted forward in his seat and I downed the drink he’d paid for. He placed a comforting hand on my lower back and I smiled.  
  
“I couldn’t just…leave him…” I stuttered out, staring over into his eyes. Connecting. “I wouldn’t know what to do with myself—not to mention he controls the money. I can’t even buy my way out of this…”  
  
I started crying again to seal the deal. The guy was overcome with this elaborate fantasy that I’d been weaving all night. He would rescue me, help me run away from the big bad wolf and I would repay him with eternal love and a fantastic sex life. He would have a chance at a woman who would owe him absolutely everything. With this in mind he pulled out his check book, scribbled down an amount and handed it to me.  
  
“Call me in the morning when he leaves for work.” The man said as I pretended to look shocked. He placed the paper in my hand and folded my fingers over it. “I’ll get you out of this, Marie. I promise.”  
  
He placed his hand on my cheek and I held it there for a moment, smiling. I leaned forward and kissed him before excusing myself to the bathroom. Shoving the paper into my purse, I pulled the garbage can over to the window and opened it. Swinging one leg over, I looked down at Stiglitz waiting there with a cigarette in his mouth. I looked back at the door and then once more at the ground.  
  
“Hey mädchen tödlich!” Stiglitz called up to me. _Lethal Lady_. A nickname he’d used when I was younger that just seemed to stick. “You coming or what?”  
  
“Yes, mein krieger.” _My warrior_ , I called him. He came over to the wall, catching me when I jumped. He set me down on the ground and let me take the cigarette for myself as we went through the alleyways until we found the car.  
  
It was a long drive back to the compound but he put the top down and I sat up on the top of the chair and let my hair fly. He let me blast the radio and I watched as the street lights got sparser the further from town we got. This was as close to being alive as we could get. My twenty-third birthday had just passed, and this was our celebration.  
  
The two of us had become the poster-children for our ward; and such a long run of obedience and success came with its perks. We were allowed more personal time, we were allowed to venture outside of the walls more often; we were _trusted_.  
  
When we got back to his room I pulled the check out and he lifted up one of the floorboards, pulling a bulging envelope out and dumping the contents onto the table. There were fourteen bundles of hundreds in varying totals. I added our latest payoff, the cheque for ten thousand euros that we would cash in next time we went out. He locked the door as I put the radio on at a respectable level.  
  
We sat down at the table and I began to count everything up. He lit up another cigarette for himself and turned on the television before sitting down beside me. He draped his arm around my middle and pressed his lips to my temple. He did this every time, and I wondered if it was his wordless way of assuring me that the act had been just that: an act. His way of saying he didn’t want to rough me up, didn’t want to be like the company.  
  
“We did it.” I could barely control the grin on my face as I turned to him. “One hundred and fifty thousand euros. Not bad for a few fake tears.”  
  
He smiled, a real and true gesture that he rarely exhibited, and leaned back against the couch. I took the last drag from the cigarette and put it out in the ash tray before I started to put everything back in the envelope. I made sure to put it back in its proper hiding place before going back and sitting front of him.  
  
“What are you going to do?” I asked, pulling my legs up to my chest and watching as the smoke danced towards the ceiling.  
  
“Butcher.” He nodded. I raised an eyebrow at him, clearly unimpressed with his choice of occupation. “Open a shop. Make you work the front. All the men will come to buy meat from the pretty girl.”  
  
“You would be so lucky.” I challenged, nudging him in the side with my foot. He grabbed it and pulled me over, taking hold of me and tickling me in all the worst places. I was caught between laughter and lack of breath as I tried to wriggle free, but I could do nothing but gasp until he finally let me go. I shoved him hard when I caught my breath but he just laughed at me. When I caught my breath I leaned back against the couch and he laid down with his head in my lap, closing his eyes.  
  
“Hugo…” I began quietly, absently running my hand through is hair. “All we have to do is make them safe and that’s it. We’ll be free.”

* * *

  
The path had forked at least four times now, which gave slightly encouraging escape prospects when it came to that. It took about twenty minutes at our fast pace, which meant we would have at least double that from the moment the grenade went off. When we got to the door, there were roots from plants and trees already starting to creep over the frame. He released my hand and dug in his right pocket until he pulled out a key. The door swung open and he nudged me inside, locking the door behind him.  
  
He found the light switch and I took in the sight of the room that would be my temporary home. It wasn’t much, but it was all we would need. There was a stocked pantry, a series of low grade single beds, a few couches, and chairs in front of a fireplace. There was a washroom off to one corner, and the whole place was wired with electricity and had the luxury of running water. I didn’t fail to notice the dynamite running along the baseboards; the last defence.  
  
I turned to face Stiglitz, heaving out a sigh and taking quick steps over to him. My arms wrapped tightly around his neck and his caged around my middle, all of the bulky weapons taking up too much space between us. It was almost like a dream, having him here in front of me. There wasn’t a single part of me that believed I’d see him again, that he would have survived the war given his taste for flashy disobedience. When I finally pulled away I rested my hands on his face.  
  
“I thought you were dead.” He said almost angrily. “You never wrote back.”  
  
“Wrote back?” I raised an eyebrow at him before understanding what had happened. “I…I never got any letters.”  
  
“Scheißkerl.” He hissed, heaving out a sigh. He pressed his lips to my forehead before taking a rectangular device from his pocket and crossing to the table in the kitchen area. I watched as he pulled a stand out of the back and set it on the table before turning it on. The screen had a small dot in the middle and began to emit a quiet beeping noise every second. There were two tiny dots almost on top of the one in the middle, and I realized it was some sort of acoustic location device that would tell us of something was getting too close.  
  
I left him to his devices and opened the door to the bathroom, resting my hands against the sink and taking a deep breath. I didn’t care if they killed me—I barely had much of a life anyways—but if they hurt my mother, if they hurt Hugo, I would kill them all. Hiring out mercenaries is a dangerous business—like playing with fire. You can only contain it for so long; thus the expiry dates and short lifespans.  
  
Peeling all the weapons and my sweaty shirt off, I tossed them into the sink and rifled through the sets of clean clothes searching for something suitable. Of course the shirts were all too big and not at all meant for a feminine frame, but they were clean and they were all I had. The feeling of skin on my back made me jump, and I realized too late in following his eyes what he was looking at. I feebly tried putting my back to the wall but he forced me back around, tracing his fingers over the tens of slashes left by the whip.  
  
“Why?” He asked seriously as I looked away.  
  
“Don’t do this…” I begged quietly, but he forced me to look at him and repeated the question. “I didn’t get any letters…But I guess _they_ did. Unfortunately for them even if I did know where you disappeared to a few lashes isn’t enough to make me talk.”  
  
Almost instantly I regretted giving in and telling him. There was darkness in his eyes, a hollowness that was filled with an unforgettable desire: bloodlust. It was bad enough that he was _willing_ to kill for me. Now, he _wanted_ to. He was staring past me, fixating on the wall but I knew what was going on in the depths of his mind. He was doing now what I had done every time they dragged my body—so near unconsciousness, beaten and bloody—back to my room. He was imagining which way killing those sons of bitches would bring him the most pleasure, and them the most pain. He was letting every minute of training and all of his experience with the Basterds turn into a weapon itself. He was trying to decide between guns and knives and hammers and torches; whether to beat or bludgeon or burn or skin alive. He would find the most cruel and inhumane way to end their life, and how to make the pain last for as long as possible.  
  
He was going to get himself killed, indulging in these fantasies. He didn’t have an army of crazy Americans and defected Germans to back him up. He didn’t have the upper hand in any sense of the term. All he had was an entire host of pissed off businessmen with an arsenal of mercenaries on his tail, and one girl who would likely be the death of him.  
  
“Don’t even think about it.” He hissed as I looked at the door which would eventually lead me to the warehouse—and the cars. The downfall about being in this situation with Stiglitz was that he could read me as well as I could read him; he knew that it made sense to me to just leave when he was sleeping, draw off the enemy for as long as I could. But then he would end up coming after me and it would just be fast forwarding to a very messy end.  
  
With a sigh I picked a random shirt from the pile and pulled it over my body. I checked the device on the table and took comfort in its empty screen. In the corner of the sleeping area there was a single rotary phone on a small round table. Crossing over, I checked my watch and dialed the number of the man I’d put in charge of getting my mother to safety. It rang three times and then he picked up, the sound of roaring engine in the background.  
  
“Let me talk to her.”  
  
“I—I can’t right now.” He sounded out of breath; I could practically imagine the sound of his speeding heart.  
  
“Put her on the god damn phone, Kaiser!”  
  
“I was too late!” He yelled, stopping my heart. The phone nearly slipped from my hand as I tried to wrap my mind around what he had just said. “Diehl was dead when I got there, they were waiting for us! There was nothing—she was already—I’m _sorry_.”  
  
“ _What?_ ” I breathed as Stiglitz entered the room.  
  
“I tried to— _sheiße!_ ” The wheels screeched to a halt and Kaiser began to scream and beg. There was a part of me that didn’t care as the company pulled him out of the car and painted his brains onto the pavement. The phone was retrieved from wherever it had fallen and the representative spoke.  
  
“Surrender yourself.”  
  
“Who is this? Did I train you?” I demanded, hands shaking as my eyes began to water. “Do you have any idea who you’re chasing? Jeneva Löw and Hugo Stiglitz. I hope you bring everyone because I’m going to find you and kill you so slowly you’ll think the world has stopped turning. And when I’m finished with you I’m going to send your pieces to your family before killing them too.”  
  
I slammed the receiver down, standing there for a moment before taking the gun from my bra and shooting at the phone. I kept shooting until the clip was empty and the tears broke through. My knees buckled and I collapsed, Stiglitz catching me before I hit the floor. I crawled into his grasp, securing my arms around his neck and trying to get a hold of myself. He kept me locked in his hold, completely silent. He didn’t tell me everything was going to be okay, because it wasn’t. He didn’t gently try and hush me, because my grief was completely fucking justified. All he gave me was what I needed: a place to feels safe for what little time we had left.  
  
“I’m going to kill them.” I asserted in my fit of tears. They had just eliminated the only leverage they had left over me anymore; there was nothing to hold me back from laying my life on the line to destroy them. “I’m going to slaughter them all like pigs.”  
  
“We’ll take it to the top.” He promised, pressing his hand to the back of my neck. “We’ll tear the whole thing down.”  
  
And I believed him. This wasn’t him pacifying me or making false promises: this is what he’d wanted to do ever since he left the academy in the first place. He would have done it years ago if they hadn’t had me on a ball and chain. The company had just made the biggest mistake of their life and got on the wrong side of their most dangerous prodigies.

* * *

  
Two solid knocks on the door, barely audible over the thunder in the sky and the rain pelting the glass. He didn’t need permission to come in, but let me know when he was anyways. I was curled up on the windowsill, watching the little ones being herded back inside from their morning break to escape the rain. One of them fell, dousing his clothes in dark mud, before being picked up by one of the older girls and pushed forward before the attendant saw.  
  
He locked the door behind him, as he always did, and took slow steps over to me. He was quiet, as he always was, and leaned on the wall in front of me. I pulled my legs closer to my chest but didn’t bother to wipe at the tears. It was the first time I’d let anyone see my cry in this place: I had learned long ago that Stiglitz would be the only person in the world other than my mother that I would ever trust again. When he noticed he pulled up a chair and waited for me to talk.  
  
“We’re never going to get out of this place, are we?” Even after the last child disappeared and the doors to the second ward were locked up I watched the yard. The lights in the far buildings flickered for a moment. This place was all I had known for years now, and I understood that I would die still tied to the whiteness and uniformity and oppression. It wouldn’t matter if we conned people out of a billion euros: it just wasn’t possible to try anything when they had our family captive.  
  
“We’re leaving tonight.” He said simply. I looked over at him, completely caught off guard. “Leila’s dead. We’ll go and get your mother. I’ve got the money, we’re leaving.”  
  
I didn’t know what to say. His sister was only twenty-one. She’d had an aggressive tumour in her brain that none of the doctors had been able to completely fix. His father had died at the end of the first world war and his mother had been lost when he was first brought to this place: it was only after they shot her that they realized his sister had an expiry date even shorter than his. But she was gone now; they had no more leverage.  
  
For him at least.  
  
“Come on.” He nodded towards the door but I stayed put, swinging my legs over and meekly crossing my arms over my chest.  
  
“I...I can’t.” I hadn’t felt such an ache in my chest since my first night in this place, when all I could see behind closed lids was my father’s death and my mother’s tears. “I can’t risk her life. They’ll be expecting you to leave, they know we’re close…They’ll be waiting for me to run.”  
  
He looked away from me and I stared at the ground, growing more exhausted by the second at all of the things I was feeling. The years of training had burned the soul right out of you; all of the killing and death and ignoring begs for mercy, they made me hard and callous and merciless—except around him. He was the only thing in this place that kept me human.  
  
“Where will you go?” I asked quietly. He explained about the army, how they needed everyone now that the great world war of 1939 was starting up. I wanted to forbid him from it, but I relinquished all hold over him the second he walked out of the door. “You know that they’ll never stop hunting you.”  
  
He got to his feet and walked a few paces away before turning back to me. He waited until I had the courage to look up at him before he spoke, and even when he did the words were strained.  
  
“I’ll get you out. I’ll find a way.”  
  
I got to my feet and wrapped my arms around him. Refusing to cry anymore and reveling in what I honestly believed to be the last time I would ever see him. He had every right to escape, and I knew that he would make it out in the real world. He would be free, perhaps enough for the both of us. But he had a limited window of time and so I pulled away. He held me there, though, and without warning he pressed his lips to mine. The action took me by complete surprise and if he hadn’t been holding me against his body I would have stumbled back. I put my hands back around his neck and deepened the kiss that was long overdue. When we finally parted I pushed him away, refusing to look at him.  
  
“Go.” I said simply, shoving him again towards the door. If he lingered for any longer it would’ve only made things harder. “Don’t look back.”

* * *

  
Stiglitz helped me to my feet and instructed me to sit down at the table. His boots clunked on the linoleum flooring as he crossed to the cupboards, opening and closing them until he found what he was looking for. He took a seat across from me and put two glasses on the table. Cracking open a bottle of Vodka, he filled the glasses and slid one over to me.  
  
Without hesitation I downed it, taking comfort in the burning sensation. He filled my glass again; the more I drank, the less it hurt. It was the bridge to numbness that I would be stuck on until the people responsible for this were dead. If it wasn’t for Stiglitz and his drinking habits when we were younger I might’ve actually gotten drunk, but that wouldn’t work out very well in the event of an ambush.  
  
When my body grew tired I left, pulling off my pants and shoes before crossing over to the beds. I pushed two of them together and climbed onto one half. The chair squeaked along the floor as he pushed away from the table and killed the lights. I could hear him rustling in the dark, accidentally falling in tune with the beeping of the radar as he kicked off his shoes and took off his shirt. He climbed into the bed beside me and I immediately turned, lying on his chest as he wrapped an arm around me.  
  
It had been ten years since the war ended, ten years that I thought he was dead—fifteen years since he left. There was no part of me that even bothered trying to forget about him, although it would’ve been easier if I did. The problem was he’d been all I knew at the academy, and even when he left I knew that no one would come close to replacing him. I knew that despite the fact I probably wouldn’t ever see him again; I was in love with him.  
  
A heavy sigh escaped me as I curled up closer against him. I remembered the nights he would sneak out of his room—risking heavy discipline—and letting me curl up with him for the night. It was usually after we had our visits with our family. He was always gone by the time we were woken up for breakfast. There was no part of me that doubted I would have died while I was still in ward one if Stiglitz hadn’t been there to train me to adapt.  
  
It suddenly clicked that despite the reunion we may not live much longer, despite my proposed destruction plan of the company; that I may not ever be here, lying with him again. It struck a pain in my chest, one that trying to move closer to him just didn’t seem to fix. I didn’t have to check to know he was still awake, and even if he hadn’t been by the time I sat upright he definitely was. He waited for me to tell him I heard something, that we had to evacuate, that it was time to gun up.  
  
Through the darkness I could make out the faint outline of his form, his eyes staring back at me in anticipation. Leaning down, my lips met his as I slowly crawled on top of him. There was a hunger, a desperation that I couldn’t mask for the life of me—but he couldn’t either. His hand tangled into my hair and the other rested on my waist until I couldn’t bear the distance anymore.  
  
Breaking free, I sat up just long enough to peel my clothes off before reconnecting with him. He let me stay there for only a moment before flipping us over and kicking his own clothes to the ground. Pulling my head back, he brushed his lips along my chest and neck as his hips crashed into mine. My hands danced from his shoulders down his chest before reaching up and taking hold of the bars on the bed frame. He braced himself on the top of the frame, his muscles rolling in and out of flex with every move he made.  
  
His breath rolled down onto my skin, and as soon as he took his hands off the frame I pushed him backwards. I pinned his shoulders down, kissing him again before I started to move my hips. I could hear him breathing out curses in the dark as his hands took a firm grip of my waist. One absently traveled up my back, tracing ever last lash that hadn’t faded yet.  
  
My body was a cage, and he was the only manufactured key. I braced myself on his chest as my body trembled, a low groan escaping him before I collapsed beside him. He kept me pressed against him, my head rising and falling with the breaths he took. He pulled my face up to his and kissed me one last time before pulling the covers over our bodies.  
  
It didn’t feel like much of a sleep at all, but it certainly did feel like waking up to an alarm. There was a heightened beeping from the radar on the table, and the two of us sprang awake as if it was a time bomb. We rushed to find our clothes in the dark, pulling on the odd articles before going over to the radar. There were about fifteen dots at the far corner of the screen, but they were relatively stationary. I grabbed my weapons and we started loading up in unison.  
  
We waited by the exit door, watching the radar and waiting. There was no guarantee they would find the entrance from Hirschberg’s basement, given how well hidden it was. I had no idea how they even found this place, but Stiglitz’s history with the Basterds must have led them here. My heart was calm: I knew that when we did run, we would end up taking at least half of those assholes out with the trigger trap. It took about five minutes, but we felt the rumble of the explosion and made our move.  
  
Stiglitz lit the fuse of the dynamite and closed the door behind him, leading the way once more with his lighter. About twenty minutes in we paused at the feeling of another explosion, bits of the dirt tunnel dislodging and falling onto us. When the earth settled again he pushed on. It was another fifteen minutes before we came to a giant steel door with a combination lock in the middle. He handed me the lighter which I held up to illuminate the numbers as he twirled the knob around.  
  
He opened the door slowly, keeping it from making any noise. The tunnel exited into some sort of maintenance closet. It was cramped without the two of us inside, but he closed the door behind us and we waited for a few minutes just to be safe. It was a damn good thing we did too, because just as we were about to leave two men from the company walked in front of the doors and stopped, talking about some soccer game. The two of us chose our weapon and pressed the mouths of the guns against the doors. He nodded to me and we fired off a round of shots, kicking the door open and watching the men fall to the ground.  
  
We were careful to always keep a loaded weapon ready, checking all around us for other mercenaries as we ran through the empty building. There was an open door up ahead and I could see the cars Hirschberg was talking about. I didn’t know where we would go, but I knew we would find some place to hold up until we decided on the best measure of attack. At least, that’s what I was thinking until he reached the doorway.  
  
He was immediately ambushed by a group of men, and I screamed his name as I tried to race up to him. I took aim at one of the guys when I was ambushed by a group of my own. I could see Stiglitz firing off a shower of bullets and I took down three of my own, but there were too many of them. They each grabbed a part of me and stripped me of my weapons. When the last of Stiglitz’s enemies fell to the ground he pointed the gun at my captors.  
  
The problem was that they all had a weapon on me. There was no way he could take them all out before one of them managed to kill me. He kept his face blank and his gun trained on one of them nonetheless.  
  
“Surrender yourself.” The ringleader demanded. I shook my head even as he pulled my hair. “Don’t make this any more difficult than it already is.”  
  
“Don’t you dare.” I hissed, staring him in the eyes as he stood frozen.  
  
“Shut your mouth!” The man commanded even as Stiglitz took a step forward.  
  
“I swear if you don’t walk out that door I’ll fucking kill you myself!” I yelled, waiting on edge like the rest of the men. I sighed in relief as he nodded to me before disappearing. Some of the men ran after him and I tried to escape, but I was knocked out quickly. Luckily for them, too: five might have been too many but I could have killed the three that stayed behind.  
  


* * *

As soon as I woke up two of the men pulled my shirt off and forced me against the cement wall, bearing my back to the ring leader. They pulled all of my hair out of the way and exposed my back before holding down my wrists and moving far enough away to be clear. I took a deep breath and held it as the first lash came. Although I had once been a regular with the whip, the letters had stopped coming at one point and so did the lashes, so I was a little rusty.

Nonetheless I kept my eyes dry, having nothing to cry for. Stiglitz had escaped and my mother was dead: if they had planned on threatening me with my life they were seriously running their business to the ground. You only ever threaten something the target cares about. I felt the blood dripping down my back by the twentieth lash and I was finally released.  
  
The men carried me over to the chair in the middle of the room and tied my hands and feet to the wooden structure. The leader asked where Stiglitz was, crashing his fist against my face three times over when I stayed silent. I didn’t need to look over at the table to know it was covered with all the tools they would use to torture me.  
  
Of course, there was a problem with these types of jobs. Anyone can swing a hammer; anyone can throw a few punches or fire bullets. Tools aren’t what make a torturer good at what they do; it’s the creativity that makes the difference between success and monstrosity. And the only way to have fantastic creativity is when you’re fueled by anger or desire or some strong emotion. Money will only ever give you sub-par results: it takes a seriously pissed off mercenary to pick up a hammer, put the pronged end into the target’s nose and pull until the skin breaks.  
  
These guys were sloppy and bored. They gave me a few cuts and bruises, drew a bit of blood, and called it a day. They put me in a room with no way out except the guarded door and left me there. They were planning on stretching it out for a few days, which I could handle. If I got too tired before they did I’d just find a way to get myself killed.  
  
I could feel the stinging on my back as the wounds tried to close up and heal: if only there was a way to tell my body _Hey, don’t bother. They’ll be going at it again tomorrow._ But my body was like an over-attentive nurse who refused to believe you when you said you were going to be fine. Not that I was going to be fine, per se, but there was certainly no point in wasting energy on something that would be for nothing.  
  
I was right, of course. On the second morning they woke me up before dawn and warmed up with lashes. Part of me wondered how these guys even made it through training: you stop the lashes after ten—anything more and the skin starts to get numb and you don’t feel a god damn thing.  
  
They tried out a few new toys, all the while demanding to know where Stiglitz went. Did they think I was stupid? I ran circles around these kids in the academy; I _invented_ some of the methods they were using on me. Did they honestly think I was stupid enough to believe that they actually wanted to know where he was? They were just hoping that he was close enough to be watching them torture me, and banking on the fact that he wouldn’t leave me for the second time—not when we’d been so close to freedom.  
  
Part of me wished he wouldn’t come back, though. I knew my whole life I was going to die young, and if it meant he could stay alive out there it was definitely worth it. But he was too stupid for that. He had a miniscule soft spot with my stupid name on it. He would be walking into a suicide mission, no matter how many weapons he brought.  
  
When the sun was high in the sky the wheels of a car crunched on the gravel outside. Blood was dripping from my nose and about ten other placed, which brought a grin onto the man’s face as he walked inside. He was the attendant who killed my father, the one who watched me at school and decided my life was worth corrupting. He came up and crouched in front of me, grabbing my face and making me look at him.  
  
“Fräulein Löw.” He smiled at me, eyes blocked by the dark sunglasses. The back of the frames disappeared between a curtain of his long, slicked-back, salt and pepper hair. “You’ve put a mark on your spotless record!”  
  
“To match the spots your boys are giving me.” I smirked, leaning back in the chair. I kept my face smug as blood oozed from the fresh lash marks. “Where’d you fetch these ones, ward two?”  
  
“I can’t deny that you’re better than them.” He nodded, getting to his feet and locking his hands behind his back as he began to pace slowly before me. “Which is why it is so _disappointing_ that you chose this pass! You had such _promise_ , Jeneva. And you’ve thrown it all away over what—a boy.”  
  
“Trust me Herr Koch, he’s more of a man than all the enhancements in the world could make you.” I blinked once before looking up at him, reeling at the sight of his shock. What else did I have to do for fun in that place than snoop into the lives of the people holding me prisoner? He grinded his teeth before motioning to the man on my right, who picked up a drill and revved it a few times.  
  
“Well Fräulein,” Koch began, smiling as he leaned in close. “All we need is for Stiglitz to attempt some naïve rescue plan. I’m going to a showing of that new Hitchcock movie when this is over, so to speed things along, we’re going to make you _scream_.”  
  
I held my breath as the man with the drill turned to me, pressed the cold metal to my upper arm, and pulled the trigger. As much as I tried, a scream erupted from my throat as the drill bit shredded my skin excruciatingly slow. My arm was trembling as I tried to get control of myself, forcing my mouth shut and closing my eyes.  
  
Gunshots forced my eyes open—because there were definitely no bullets entering me—and I watched as my torturer fell to the ground, blood seeping out of his disfigured face. I looked up, my heart fluttering at the sight of Stiglitz. He wasn’t alone, though, and as the other mercenaries started to fire the surviving members of the Inglourious Basterds stepped out of the shadows and started mowing them down.  
  
Aldo Raine, Smithson Utivich, Andy Kagan, Michael Zimmerman, even Hirschberg was there. They spread out, attacking all of the guards as Stiglitz made a b-line towards me. As he neared Koch got behind me, holding a gun to my head and ordering me to stop. It was the stupidest threat of all, because the only thing that would have made Stiglitz more pissed than he already was was by killing me. He threw Koch to the ground and called Kagan over to hold him down while he cut me free.  
  
“You should have left me.” I scolded as he helped me to my feet. His eyes were glued to my body, looking over every single wound they left on my nearly naked torso. I fished a square of fabric out of his pocket and he quickly wrapped it around my arm as I wiped the blood from my mouth. The last of the guards were killed and the Basterds lined up in front of Stiglitz and me.  
  
“So you’re the girl in the photograph.” Aldo said, smiling at Stiglitz before holding out his hand. “Lieutenant Aldo Raine, these are—”  
  
“The Basterds, yes. Jeneva Löw. I want to thank you for coming all the way over here for this.” I shook all of their hands individually, ignoring the looks they gave my battered body. Turning to the weapons table, I picked up one of the guns and made sure the clip was full before facing Koch. The Basterds moved aside, save Kagan who kept a firm grip. I took aim and shot him in the foot. It was astounding, that for someone who ruled a place where pain was punishment he had such a low tolerance himself. “Every time you lie to me you will be punished.”  
  
“I don’t—I don’t know what you want!” He screamed as I took a step closer to him. My legs trembled and nearly buckled causing Stiglitz to offer as a replacement; but I promised I would be fine and pressed the gun to Koch’s left kneecap.  
  
“Liar.” I pulled the trigger, keeping a blank face as his blood sprayed onto me. He wailed and wailed until I grew bored of the sound and moved the gun to his crotch. “Tell me where Austerlitz is and I’ll kill you quickly.”  
  
“ _Please_.” He begged, tears streaming down his face. “Let me go and I’ll take you to him!”  
  
“ _Liar_.” I fired two shots into his balls and left him to reel for a moment, tossing the gun to the side and returning to the table. Picking up the hammer and a single nail, I returned when Koch’s cries were reduced to whimpers and begs. I nodded to Stiglitz and he took Kagan’s place, putting Koch in a headlock. “Mister Utivitch, Mister Zimmerman, if you would be so kind as to hold this piece of shit down.”  
  
“Oh God.” Koch whimpered as the Basterds held him down. I got on top of him and Stiglitz tilted his head up while I held the nail above his eye. “Oh _God!_ ”  
  
“This is your last strike, Herr Koch. If you lie to me again I won’t ask you any more questions, I’ll just torture you until you’re dead. Tell me where Austerlitz is.”  
  
“Dresden!” He cried out. “He lives in Dresden! He goes…He goes under the name Müeller, Thomas Müeller. Everyone in the town knows him. This is the truth!”  
  
“I believe you.” He sighed in relief as I wiped the blood from my face. “Unfortunately for you I still remember all the things you did to me in the academy, so consider this payback.”  
  
Stiglitz kept his head steady even as he writhed around trying to escape. I pushed the nail onto his eyelid and hammered it in. It took three hits for the nail to go all the way in, and I was hard pressed to gag him just to shut him up. I got off of him and tossed the hammer to Utivitch.  
  
“Feel like breaking his hands?” I took a few steps back to get a good view as Stiglitz came over to me. He shrugged out of his bomber jacket helped me get it on. I fished a cigarette out of the front pocket and lit it, watching the man scream. “Cut his tongue off, would you?”  
  
He handed me a gun to call my own and pulled a knife out before going over to the man. Raine held his head down and Stiglitz reached his hand into Koch’s mouth, pulling out his tongue and sawing it off in slow, jagged movements. Blood spurted everywhere and I took a long drag of my cigarette. I took the knife from Stiglitz and motioned for everyone to step back. Koch was far too broken to put up any more resistance. I grabbed him by the hair and heaved his head up before slicing his throat open and leaving him to bleed out. Wiping the blade on his shirt, I got to my feet and returned the knife.  
  
“Well you sure as hell weren’t kiddin’ when you said a dame worth dyin’ for.” Raine remarked as I spat blood from my mouth. I turned to face Stiglitz, giving him a look.  
  
“The girl in the photograph?” I asked, smirking as he rolled his eyes.  
  
“You heard how your man here killed them thirteen Gestapo majors back in the war?” Raine asked. I laughed, nodding to the dying man on the ground.  
  
“He gave me fifty lashes when he found the newspaper article in my pocket.”  
  
“Well when we broke him outta jail he only had one thang in his effects that wasn’t a weapon, and that was a folded up picher o’ you.”  
  
The bleeding started to slow from my nose and I smiled faintly, offering Stiglitz the rest of my cigarette. We stood around while Koch gurgled out his last breaths and then Utivitch looked up at Stiglitz and me.  
  
“So…Dresden?”


End file.
